This application claims priority of Taiwanese Application No. 091211064, filed on Jul. 19, 2002.
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a cutter for a wood planing machine, more particularly to a cutter that is adapted to be installed in a wood planing machine and that includes a blade with a plurality of positioning tabs.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIGS. 1 and 2 illustrate a conventional cutter of a wood planing machine to be driven by a motor (not shown) for planing a wooden workpiece (not shown). The cutter includes an elongated blade supporting block piece 100 that is generally cylindrical in shape and that is formed with a plurality of blade-mounting grooves 102, and a plurality of blades 2 respectively mounted in the blade-mounting grooves 102. A plurality of screw bolts 3 threadedly engage the block piece 100, and abut respectively against the blades 2 so as to retain and fasten the blades 2 in the blade-mounting grooves 102.
The conventional cutter is disadvantageous in that the blades 2 tend to be misaligned in the respective blade-mounting grooves 102 during a planing operation. Moreover, since all of the points of a cutting edge of each blade 2 are simultaneously in contact with the workpiece during the planing operation, the friction force between each blade 2 and the workpiece is relatively large, thereby considerably increasing the load of the motor.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a cutter that is adapted to be installed in a wood planing machine and that is capable of overcoming the aforesaid drawbacks.
According to the present invention, a cutter is adapted to be installed in a wood planing machine, and comprises: an elongated block piece having two opposite ends, a blade-mounting face that extends along the length of the block piece between the ends of the block piece, and a positioning groove that is indented inwardly from the blade-mounting face in a transverse direction relative to the blade-mounting face and that extends along the length of the blade-mounting face so as to divide the blade-mounting face into opposite first and second mounting-portions, the positioning groove being defined by a groove-confining wall; and a flexible elongated blade having a first side portion attached to the first mounting-portion, a second side portion attached to the second mounting-portion, an intermediate portion interconnecting the first and second side portions and disposed over and aligned with the positioning groove, and a plurality of spaced apart positioning tabs which are aligned along the length of the positioning groove, which project from the intermediate portion into the positioning groove, and which abut against the groove-confining wall so as to enhance positioning of the blade at the block piece prior to fastening of the blade to the block piece.